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TRAINING INSTITUTIONS. 1. CHRISTCHURCH. Sir,— Normal School, Christchurch, Bth March, 1879. I have the honor to submit my report on the work of the Normal School for the year ending 31st December, 1878. But the object of such a report would be only very partially attained if it did not take cognizance alike of the present and the future as well as of the past, and apply the results of previous experience to the solution of the problems awaiting immediate consideration. And this is more practicable now than it would have been two months since, as we can more calmly review the past, and more truthfully estimate the value of the work done, while we have had the advantage of the additional experience, enabling us to gauge more accurately future requirements, and to correct the mental forecast made at the close of the last year's work. I purpose, therefore, with your permission, to discuss in this report some matters intimately connected with the welfare of the institution, and which will, I conceive, demand urgent attention at no very distant date. The year has been one of the greatest anxiety to all engaged in the working of the school, and the strain on me personally has been at times intense. There was a time when I considered the efficiency of the work seriously imperilled, and the suspense is not entirely over yet, though things look somewhat more hopeful. Under these circumstances, it would have been satisfactory to find that the school had not retrograded ; and it is especially satisfactory to find that, in spite of many and serious drawbacks, the year has been one of perceptible progress in every department of our work. The number of students in training has varied slightly from time to time, but for the greater part of the year has shown a general tendency to increase. The highest number on the books at any one time has been 71; the present number is 63—namely, 47 females and 16 males —as against a total of 53—namely, 39 females and 14 males —at the corresponding period last year. Some have been with us for nearly two years, several for more than one, aud they, almost without exception, show decided aptitude for the teacher's profession, of which a larger proportion than hitherto have had some previous experience. The majority of the students will remain until after the certificate examination, though some most promising ones will leave immediately, unable longer to bear the pecuniary strain. After March we shall have a general exodus, and at present I see little prospect of so many students next year unless we should receive unexpected accessions from other districts. But we shall doubtless have sufficient to supply our own immediate needs, and the success of the school will depend less on the number of its students than on its efficiency, to which, perhaps, large numbers do not greatly conduce. During the year I received with much pleasure numerous letters of inquiry from distant localities, but the expense of training has in every instance proved too great for the candidates to bear. It certainly seems to me that this burden ought not to be laid upon them at all. The work is of such great national importance that every possible facility for training should be afforded to eligible candidates. Any money so spent would prove one of the wisest possible investments of the public money. The lady-students greatly outnumber those of the opposite sex. The proportion is nearly three to one. No improvement in this respect is perceptible, and the matter is becoming serious. The only remedy seems to be to offer special inducements to male students. So many trades and professions are open to them, offering an immediate and substantial pecuniary reward for their labour, that we caunot be surprised at the preference shown for these callings, especially when we remember that the ultimate advantages they confer are far greater than those to be realized iv the scholastic profession. There is a considerable annual leakage from the ranks of the pupil-teachers for the same reason. But even this is not the full extent of the evil. Many pupil-teachers who remain in the profession do not realize the value of training, nor are they likely to do so while School Committees seem so insensible to its advantages. AVhat then can be done to remedy these evils ? Direct pressure cannot well be brought to bear, but perhaps indirect pressure might be exercised in some one or more of these various ways: (a.) A year's training might be given to a specified number of candidates who passed their final examinations as pupil-teachers with especial credit, and thus gave primd facie evidence of exceptional fitness for the profession, (b.) Pupil-teachers, who at the end of their third year of service passed particularly well, might be allowed to spend the last year of their apprenticeship in the training school, receiving that pecuniary assistance during the time which they would have been entitled to as pupilteachers of the fourth year, (c.) Scholarships might be offered to students in training, thus holding out a reasonable hope of assistance to any of more than average ability, and enabling them, if they wished it, to continue their studies for an additional period, (d.) District School Committees might be recommended —other things being equal—to give the preference to trained teachers in any appointments they were called upon to make. I am the more anxious to secure some pecuniary aid for our students as they are now placed on a different footing from those in the sister institution at Dunedin, and we are thus unfairly handicapped in the friendly competition. But, apart from personal considerations, on public grounds, in the best interests of education, something should be done in this matter, or we shall never be able to secure an adequate supply of skilled schoolmasters. The training pupil-teachers get iv the great majority of cases is not worth consideration. They have been taught or led to adopt certain modes of work, but have very little knowledge of principles, and have not made their profession the subject of scientific study. They reproduce generally the system of the school in which they were brought up, good or bad. They go on working in a stereotyped way, but, having no competent theoretical knowledge to guide their practice, make serious blunders, exhibit the gravest defects, and find out only by long and painful experience what they might easily have been prepared for at the outset. In the majority of cases the headmasters